Western-centrism or Western-centrism is an idea that emphasizes the superiority of Western culture, which is originally a historical illusion of Westerners. The dominant position of Western culture in modern times has further reinforced this illusion of Westerners. At present, it has become a very urgent task to promote the construction of the discipline system, academic system and discourse system of philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics, and surpassing Western centrism is not simply overthrowing the existing disciplinary foundation, nor is it a return to the traditional knowledge system and discourse system.
Sun Xiaochun, a professor at Nankai University's Zhou Enlai School of Government and Management, believes that the only reliable reason to go beyond Western-centrism and build a discourse system with Chinese characteristics can only be modernization. Contemporary China is in the historical process of modernization, beyond Western-centrism is a large-scale system project, should have a modern vision and international vision, while changing the previous situation of eating foreign food, avoid blind retro, sublime tendency, strengthen the study of basic theories and methods, while further strengthening the study of Western thought, culture and philosophy and social science, this is the only way to surpass Western-centrism.
Key takeaways:
1
To go beyond Western-centrism and build a knowledge system of philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics, we must have a modern vision and an international vision. The discourse system with Chinese characteristics should be an open academic system, to avoid falling into the dilemma of self-talk, so that the discourse with Chinese characteristics can be understood and accepted by people in other parts of the world, and the discourse system with Chinese characteristics can become the knowledge that the whole world can understand, which is the goal of our efforts.
2
In the process of building a discipline system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, while changing the previous situation of not eating foreign food, we should also avoid the blind retro and sublime tendency. The real problems in contemporary Chinese social life require people in the modern era to rely on their own rationality to understand and solve, and to construct a philosophical and social science discourse system in contemporary China, which can only rely on the rationality of contemporary Chinese rather than the historical tradition.
3
Beyond Western-centrism and building a discourse system with Chinese characteristics, basic theoretical research is the top priority. Applied research is important, but theoretical research is even more important, because applied research presupposes theory, and it is the theory that is applied in applied research and not others. Without basic theoretical research, applied research has become a water without a source and a wood without a root.
4
In order to transcend Western centrism and build a disciplinary system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, we should further strengthen the study of Western thought, culture, philosophy and social science.
More exciting perspectives
With the advancement of China's socialist modernization construction, when the Chinese nation is ushering in a great leap from standing up and getting rich to becoming strong, "promoting the construction of the discipline system, academic system, and discourse system of philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics" has become a very urgent task before us. As a result, transcendent Western-centrism or Western-centrism has become a topic of discussion in academic circles. In the discussion, people have reached a basic consensus on the point of transcending Western-centrism and building a philosophical and social science system with Chinese characteristics. However, there are still many problems that need to be solved on how to transcend Western-centrism and how to build a disciplinary system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics. This article attempts to present its own views on the following issues in order to teach the reader.
Western-centrism: an illusion of history
Western-centrism or Western-centrism is an idea that emphasizes the superiority of Western culture, and in Westerners, this term expresses a sense of self-superiority that has been formed over a long period of history. Therefore, to understand Western-centrism or Western-centrism, we must first have a historical perspective.
The results of modern archaeology and historiography show that human civilization is pluralistic. The pluralistic character of civilization was determined at the moment when human civilization first took place. For us living in the modern era, many details of the beginning of human civilization and people's living conditions cannot be known in detail, but one thing is certain, human civilization has occurred in many places, and traces of ancient civilization can be found on the continents of Asia, Africa, and Europe. The pluralism of the source of civilization determines the diversity of human culture. The cultural sense of self-superiority of some nationalities is also formed in the environment of civilizational pluralism.
Many ethnic groups have had a sense of cultural superiority, which is related to the relatively closed geographical environment of a certain historical period. In ancient times, civilizations developed separately in a relatively closed geographical environment, which objectively led to cultural differences between ethnic groups, the so-called "Hiroya Oikawa heterogeneous system, people's livelihood in between the heterogeneous", described this fact.
The closed geographical environment and cultural differences have objectively affected people's understanding of people in previous eras. According to the view of cultural anthropology, the development process of human civilization is also the process of understanding man by people living in different historical environments, and this process begins with self-knowledge. The German scholar Michael Landmann said that one of the characteristics of early people's self-interpretation was to judge whether a person was a member of their own nation or not, "They are far from being able to identify their own class very comprehensively, and even in a culture as developed as Egyptian, only Egyptians retain the privilege of being a human being." All foreigners are not 'human', and this phenomenon is called ethnocentrism." What Landman calls "ethnocentrism" is a concept similar to cultural centrism or cultural centrism, and one of the important reasons for the emergence of ethnocentrism or cultural centrism is the lack of a comprehensive understanding of people.
When people living in different geographical areas have formed their own national culture, whether they share a culture with themselves is often used as a basis for judging whether a person or an ethnic group is a human being. This has happened in the history of both the East and the West. Centuries ago, according to Michael Landman, Europeans were discussing whether the rest of the world was human. In their view, "only the 'Christian man' (an expression that has remained well known since Martin Luther) is truly a man." "The real reason for the crusades in the Middle Ages and the slave trade in recent history is that Westerners did not treat people outside of Christendom as human beings. Historically, the culture of each ethnic group has exclusion, and each ethnic group has a sense of self-superiority in terms of culture, and during the Spring and Autumn Period of ancient China and the Warring States Period, the Huaxia people in the Central Plains called the surrounding ethnic minorities barbarians, Yi, Rong, and Di. After the Qin and Han Dynasties, the difference between Huayi and Yi has always been valued by successive Chinese, and in the Ming and Qing dynasties, Western colonists who came to China were also called "Hongmaoyi" and "Xiyi". It is the exclusionary characteristics of culture and the sense of self-superiority that enable a nation's culture to be maintained in the long course of history.
The sense of self-superiority of national culture is also related to the imbalance in cultural development among various ethnic groups in history. Historically, due to complex reasons, in a certain geographical area, it is often the culture of a certain ethnic group that has taken the lead in developing, thus having a dominant position in a specific geographical space, and the Chinese culture originating in the Yellow River Basin and the Western culture originating from Greece and Rome belong to this situation. For a long period of history, both Chinese culture and Western culture have promoted the progress of human civilization in the areas they can influence, which is an undeniable historical fact. However, it is precisely this fact that gives people the illusion that beyond the geographical boundaries they perceive, there are many types of civilizations and cultures, each with its own value and meaning.
The Warring States thinker Mencius once said when talking about the Huayi issue: "I have heard of those who have changed yi with Xia, but I have not heard of those who have changed from Yi." On the positive side, Mencius spoke of the fact that the Chinese culture in the heart of the Yellow River Basin was more advanced than the culture of the surrounding areas, but on the other hand, this sentence also reflected a certain sense of cultural superiority, in Mencius's view, Yidi needed to be changed by Chinese culture, and behind Mencius, this sense of cultural superiority was constantly amplified. Until the end of the 18th century, when the British minister Magalney came to China, the rulers of the Qing Dynasty still thought that the Qing Dynasty was the center of the world, that "the places administered by the Heavenly Dynasty were far away", and that "the envoys of foreign domains to Beijing" were nothing more than "devotion to the country". The cultural superiority of ancient Chinese was more due to a lack of understanding of the outside world.
After the Opium War, when Chinese learned more about the world, they gradually came out of the illusion of self-superiority. On the contrary, due to the historical process of the entire world since modern times, Westerners have gone farther and farther in the illusion of self-superiority. The temporary lead in the process of modernization objectively strengthens the inherent sense of self-superiority of Westerners. They believe that the history of human society is centered on Western civilization, which is the benchmark of human civilization, and their responsibility is to save all human beings outside Western civilization. In recent history, the frenzied colonization of Europeans around the world has largely been the result of this notion. But what many Westerners are reluctant to mention is that while selling their culture to the world, Westerners have committed crimes outside of Europe.
In short, Western-centrism or Western-centrism is a historical illusion, and if this illusion is rooted in the sense of self-superiority that Westerners have had since ancient times, then the historical fact that Western countries have taken the lead in embarking on the road of modernization in modern times has strengthened this illusion to some extent.
Modernization: Reasons beyond Western-centrism
In the 1950s and 1960s, there was a discussion in American academia about "political development", and the core of this discussion was the political development of developing countries, which was first discussed mainly by political scientists, and later by scholars in sociology, economics, history, and anthropology. According to the situation that many non-Western countries embarked on the road of industrialization after World War II, some scholars who held Western-centristic ideas became interested in the political prospects of developing countries. In their view, the political status quo of Western countries is the future of non-Western countries, and the goal of political development in these countries is to establish the same political structure as contemporary Western countries. However, this view has also been questioned by researchers of history and cultural anthropology: the political development of non-Western countries does not necessarily repeat the historical experience of Europe, and western countries are not the ideal model for the political development of all non-Western countries. The crux of the matter is to figure out what is Western and what is modern. For Western-centrists, this view is nothing less than a sobering agent. In fact, this view also has certain reference significance for those of us who intend to go beyond Western-centrism. To transcend Western-centrism and establish a discourse system and academic system with Chinese characteristics, it is also necessary to distinguish between what is Western and what is modern. Therefore, the discussion of the issue of transcending Western-centrism should have a modern perspective.
According to the understanding of sociology, modernization is a global and rapid process of social change involving all aspects of social life, which mainly includes economic modernization with industrialization as the core, political modernization marked by democracy and efficiency, people's lives from rural-centered to urban-centered urbanization, and the modernization of organizational management starting from the bureaucratic system. This historical process began with the modern British Revolution and gradually spread to the whole world.
As the historical process of modernization unfolded on a global scale, Westerners brought their science and technology, knowledge, ideology and culture, and even way of life to all parts of the world, so that some things that were originally Western became modern. So much so that in today's international community, many of the prevailing rules and standards are established by Westerners. While modernizing is changing the social life of every country, it has also pushed these standards and rules to every country that has embarked on the road to modernization. If a country wants to become a modern country, it must accept the modern knowledge and international rules and standards that the West recognizes and promotes. For example, the units of measurement, the grams, kilograms (tons), meters, kilometers (kilometers), liters and "barrels" used in oil trading, which are currently used internationally, were originally units of measurement used by Westerners, but when these units of measurement were accepted by the whole world, they became international standards. In today's world, no country can participate in the economic activities of the international community without accepting these units of measurement. Another example is competitive sports, except for taijiquan, Go, Chinese chess and other sports, most sports originate from the West, and the competition rules are also established according to the standards of Western countries. No country can become part of today's international sports family without accepting these rules.
After the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, under the guidance of the policy of reform and opening up, China entered the fast lane of socialist modernization. In just a few decades, we have established a modern enterprise system and a socialist market economic system, and rapidly narrowed the gap with developed countries in the field of science and technology. The policy of reform and opening up has not only stimulated economic vitality, but also promoted the reform and political development of our country's political system. In terms of the construction of socialist democracy and the rule of law, while the system of people's congresses has been continuously improved, the Fifteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China has clearly put forward the strategic goal of governing the country according to law and building a socialist country ruled by law; the second session of the Ninth National People's Congress in 1999 has written the principle of governing the country according to law into the Constitution, and the Fourth Plenary Session of the Eighteenth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China has made the "Decision of the CPC Central Committee on Several Major Issues Concerning Comprehensively Promoting Governing the Country According to Law." In terms of the construction of spiritual civilization, the Eighteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed for the first time, "advocating prosperity and strength, democracy, civilization and harmony, advocating freedom, equality, justice and the rule of law, advocating patriotism, dedication, integrity and friendliness, and actively cultivating and practicing the core values of socialism." The report of the Nineteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China also pointed out: "Give play to the leading role of the core socialist values in national education, the creation of spiritual civilization, and the creation, production and dissemination of spiritual and cultural products, and integrate the core socialist values into all aspects of social development and transform them into people's emotional identity and behavior habits." At the same time, the modernization of national governance has also entered the agenda of contemporary China's political construction. Modernization has fundamentally improved the quality of social life in our country.
Since the beginning of reform and opening up, the history of China's socialist modernization has proved that "integrating the universal truth of Marxism with China's specific reality, taking our own road, and building socialism with Chinese characteristics" is the only correct choice, and our country's achievements in economic and social development have all been obtained through this road. The author believes that we must also have a complete and accurate understanding of the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics. The path of socialism with Chinese characteristics is a road based on China's national conditions and rapidly advancing China's socialist modernization. This means that, on the one hand, we cannot copy the experience of Western countries and simply imitate the political and economic systems of Western countries. On the other hand, socialism with Chinese characteristics, with modernization as the goal, is also different from the traditional and rigid socialism with the planning system as the core. As we remain steadfast in our march down this path, we should not reject the basic elements of the modern state. Therefore, we have to understand what is Western and what is modern.
According to the author's understanding, beyond Western-centrism, "building a discipline system, academic system, and discourse system of philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics" should also be understood from the perspective of modernization. The main reason why we focus on transcending Western centrism and building a discipline system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics is to further promote the historical process of our country's socialist modernization through the construction of a discipline system with Chinese characteristics.
Why we should link transcendativism to modernization, it is necessary to mention the discussion of the localization of the social sciences in recent years. Some scholars believe that the paradigm of modernization is not only not conducive to the development of China's social sciences, but also an obstacle to the development of social sciences on the mainland. For example, Deng Zhenglai said when discussing where Chinese legal science should go: "The reason why Chinese legal science is unable to lead the development of China's legal system is that they are all governed by a 'modern paradigm', and this 'paradigm' not only indirectly provides a 'Western legal ideal picture' for the development of China's legal system, but also makes Chinese legal scholars unaware that what they provide is not China's own 'ideal picture of law'; At the same time, this dominant 'paradigm of modernization' is incapable of explaining and resolving the problems that arise from its own role, culminating in the so-called 'paradigm' crisis. Therefore, he believes that the way out of Chinese jurisprudence is to end this old era of jurisprudence dominated by the "Paradigm of Western Modernity" and open a new era of jurisprudence that consciously studies the "ideal picture of Chinese law". I do not agree with this statement.
The localization of philosophical and social science research is certainly the right direction for development. The question, however, is how we should localize and how to construct a philosophical and social science system that belongs to our country and our time. Indeed, as some scholars have pointed out, in the decades after the reform and opening up, we have experienced a stage of introducing a large number of modern social sciences from the West. It must be admitted that in many fields of research, the basic knowledge and research methods that have been introduced over the years have been accepted by us. This forms the basis of the reality of the current continental philosophy and social sciences. The reason why our country's philosophical and social science research has been able to narrow the distance with the international academic community in just a few decades, have the ability to participate in academic dialogue in the international community, and become a member of the international academic community is entirely dependent on the reform and opening up policy since the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. Today, our country is still in the process of socialist modernization, and when we have clearly defined the goal of transcending Western centrism and establishing a disciplinary system, academic system, and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, the existing academic foundation is precisely the starting point for us to achieve transcendence.
Transcending Western centrism and building a disciplinary system with Chinese characteristics is consistent with the development direction of our country's modernization. This objectively determines that the development direction of philosophy and social science with Chinese characteristics cannot be a return to tradition. In the trend of sinology and the idea of reconstructing Confucianism that was once popular in previous years, some people have advocated abandoning the existing discipline classification method and returning to the traditional classification of disciplines that are not separated by literature, history and philosophy, and some people have advocated replacing the existing academic discourse with traditional terms such as "wang dao" to rebuild the traditional knowledge system. These ideas are actually not feasible.
At present, many of the concepts and terms used in philosophical and social science research are foreign. For example, GDP (gross domestic product), CPI (consumer price index), PPI (producer price index), M1 (narrow money), M2 (broad money), etc., which are commonly used in the economic community, these terms and related analytical methods are very effective tools for describing and analyzing socio-economic development and monetary policy, and so far, they have not been able to replace their terminology and analysis methods. If we disregard this reality of social science development and blindly pursue localization or return to tradition, the consequences will be catastrophic.
The same is true of political science, which I am more familiar with. In the current study of political science, many of the concepts we use, such as democracy, autocracy, etc., can be found in classical Chinese literature, but our understanding of these concepts is very different from that of the ancients. "Democracy" means "master of the people" in traditional Chinese discourse, but in modern times, as a paraphrase of democracy, it refers to a political system with people's sovereignty as the basic principle. "Despotism" in ancient Chinese literature originally meant that the power of the ministers was arbitrary, and the chaos of the government was chaotic, as evidenced by the fact that "the infant is the king, the minister is despotic, the tree is the party, and the number of lands to be handed over can also die" is evidenced by this. However, after the Sino-Japanese Sino-Japanese War in modern times, when Zheng Guanying, Yan Fu, Kang Youwei and others pondered the reasons for China's weakness and compared China's traditional monarchy with the constitutional monarchy of modern Western countries, "autocracy" gradually became a concept used to describe the political system in which power was highly concentrated in traditional Chinese society. Kang Youwei wrote to the Guangxu Emperor during the Penghu Reformation: "Our country practices an autocratic government, and a monarch and a number of ministers rule their country together, and the country is not weak. Some people say that the traditional Chinese society is called an authoritarian state, and Montesquieu is the initiator, which is contrary to historical facts. Kang Youwei's use of the concept of "autocracy" was in 1898, and Montesquieu's "On the Spirit of the Law" was understood by Chinese intellectual circles in a later period. Today, when the connotations of many concepts in traditional discourse have undergone essential changes and colleagues in the academic circles have formed a basic consensus on these concepts, it is impossible to return to traditional discourse.
On the whole, the author believes that transcending Western-centrism is not simply overthrowing the existing disciplinary foundation, nor is it a return to the traditional knowledge system and discourse system. The direction of our efforts should be to build a knowledge system that is more reasonable, more explanatory, and more instructive and normative for human social life than the existing academic system. In this sense, the only reliable reason to go beyond Western-centrism and build a discourse system with Chinese characteristics can only be modernization.
Building a knowledge system with Chinese characteristics is a large-scale system project
Beyond Western-centrism, the necessity and importance of building a philosophical and social science discipline system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics is self-evident. When we are committed to building a philosophical and social science system with Chinese characteristics, we must also realize that this is a large-scale systematic project that cannot be completed overnight, and whether we can complete this task with high quality depends to a large extent on our understanding of the discipline system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, and to what extent we make effective efforts.
First of all, to go beyond Western-centrism and build a philosophical and social science knowledge system with Chinese characteristics, we must have a modern vision and an international vision. The philosophical and social science system with Chinese characteristics that we want to build is not only Chinese with Chinese characteristics, but more importantly, it should also be modern, and the latter is more important than the former. In human history, the development of ideological scholarship has always been inseparable from the growth of knowledge and the refinement of academic theory, and the general trend of the evolution of ideological scholarship is that old knowledge is replaced by advanced knowledge, and the role of regional and national factors in this process is very limited. On the surface, the ideological culture and knowledge system that has been popular in the whole world in modern times is Western, but in fact, the fundamental reason why these things can be popular throughout the world and accepted by people in many places outside the West is not only that they are Western, but because modern Western culture is more advanced than non-Western culture and knowledge system, which contains more modern elements. In today's world, which is becoming more and more a whole and highly informatized, it is impossible to achieve the transcendence of Western-centrism by relying on localization alone.
In recent years, in the discussion on the localization of social sciences and the construction of Chinese discourse, some scholars have commented on the current status of political science research: "Most of the concepts, basic assumptions, analytical frameworks, and research methods we use come from the West, and even the hot topics we discuss are often proposed by Westerners." Western mainstream political science, on the other hand, does not discuss the problems we raise, let alone use the concepts, basic assumptions, analytical frameworks, and research methods we have developed, so the purpose of constructing a Chinese discourse in political science is to change the long-standing role of Chinese scholars as "consumers and importers of concepts, theories, and methods." The essence of this statement is that Chinese scholars should use local concepts, local theories and local methods to study and explain China's problems, or that is, "use the discourse system with Chinese characteristics to interpret China's road, Chinese practice and Chinese experience", which is reasonable in a sense, and political science with Chinese characteristics should first face the Chinese problem. If this were not the case, political science would lose its relevance in China.
However, when localized concepts, theories, and methods become our academic vision, we cannot ignore the other side of the problem, the political science discourse system with Chinese characteristics, so that the philosophical and social science discourse system with Chinese characteristics cannot exist in isolation, and the purpose of building a Chinese discipline system, academic system, and discourse system is not only to use Chinese concepts, theories, and methods to explain Chinese problems, but more importantly, to surpass the existing knowledge system based on Western modern philosophy and social science. This is because in the information age, which is accelerating the process of globalization, it is difficult for an academic system that can only explain the real problems of one country to exist independently. As some scholars have pointed out, "pure local knowledge cannot form dialogue, nor can it produce identity", the discourse system with Chinese characteristics should be an open academic system, to avoid falling into the dilemma of self-talk, so that our characteristic discourse can be understood and accepted by people in other parts of the world, so that the discourse system with Chinese characteristics that we want to build become the knowledge that the whole world can understand, which is the goal of our efforts.
Secondly, in the process of building a discipline system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, while changing the previous situation of eating foreign food, we should also avoid the blind retro and sublime tendency. Since the 1980s, there has indeed been a period of introduction of Western philosophical and social science theories and methods in mainland academic circles. However, if we trace back to the roots, this process began as early as the end of the 19th century, the era of Yan Fu and Liang Qichao. The introduction of Western modern thought and culture into China is certainly related to the strong position of Western countries in modern history, but on the other hand, it also shows that traditional Chinese academic thinking is far from meeting the needs of China's modernization. Since the reform and opening up, the academic community has introduced a large number of foreign philosophical and social science theories and methods for the same reason.
Since the reform and opening up, through the introduction of modern foreign philosophical and social science theories and methods, our philosophical and social science research has achieved historical progress. However, we should also see that in this process, there have indeed been some deviations. When some scholars introduce certain theories and methods in Western academic circles, especially the more popular theories and methods in recent decades, into China, they often do not judge their meanings, do not investigate the reason, and use them in a jujube manner, or even misuse them. For example, in Western academia, game theory was originally a branch of modern mathematics, and later, the views and methods of game theory were introduced into the economic community and became an effective analytical method. Since then, game theory has entered the fields of political science, law, sociology and other disciplines. Although the understanding and application of game theory are different in different disciplines, it is consistent in the most fundamental point, that is, the two parties or parties involved in the game are equal subjects, and these subjects may reach a contract at a certain point on the basis of their respective opinions. However, some scholars have ignored this crucial point, using the perspective of the game to explain the relationship between the central and local governments in our country, and interpreting what people usually call "policies at the top and countermeasures at the bottom" as "games". I have encountered this situation more than once in the review and defense of my doctoral dissertation. In fact, to explain the relationship between the central and local governments from the perspective of the game is a distorted understanding of the relationship between the central and local governments in our country.
In recent years, the situation of non-adaptation has occurred to varying degrees in many disciplines. It can be said that changing this situation of not being able to eat foreign food is also an important reason why we must go beyond Western-centrism and build a philosophical and social science discourse system with Chinese characteristics. However, at the same time, the author does not agree with the more popular retro tendencies at present. As mentioned above, some scholars believe that the construction of a discourse system with Chinese characteristics is to return to tradition, and we should go to history to find answers to practical questions. However, the social environment in which the ancient people lived was fundamentally different from that of our time, and the social themes of the previous era were completely different from those of our time. What happens in the course of empirical history is only the object of our knowledge and does not provide us with solutions to real problems. The real problems in contemporary Chinese social life require people in the modern era to rely on their own rationality to understand and solve, and to construct a philosophical and social science discourse system in contemporary China, which can only rely on the rationality of contemporary Chinese rather than the historical tradition.
Third, to transcend Western-centrism and build a discourse system with Chinese characteristics, basic theoretical research is the top priority. Like the natural sciences, the development of philosophy and social sciences fundamentally depends on the progress of theories and methods. In each discipline branch of the social sciences, the definition and connotation of basic concepts are clarified and determined through theoretical research, the logical relationship between concepts and the basic norms of disciplines are also established through theoretical research, and the value of regulating and leading social life is also constructed through theoretical research. If a discipline is a pyramid, theoretical research is the cornerstone of the pyramid, which determines the height that a discipline may reach. Similarly, as a researcher of philosophy and social science, how theoretical cultivation is fundamentally determined is what realm he can achieve in the research he is engaged in. Beyond Western-centrism and the construction of a discourse system with Chinese characteristics, we can only start from strengthening basic theoretical research, and there is no other way.
Our social science research has always had a tendency to attach importance to application, and this tendency is especially evident in applied disciplines such as political science and management. It cannot be denied that attaching importance to applied research orientation is of great significance to promoting and prospering the social science research of our country and making our academic research closer to the real social life. However, while applied research is important, theoretical research is even more important, because the premise of applied research is theory, and it is theory that is applied in applied research and not others. Without basic theoretical research, applied research has become a water without a source and a wood without a root.
When more emphasis is placed on applied research, theoretical research is intentionally or unintentionally ignored, so that theoretical research becomes an indisputable fact that it is becoming weaker and weaker. In terms of the field of political science that I am familiar with, in recent years, although there are also theoretical research results from a lofty height, they are by no means common, and the most common are big data, performance evaluation, grassroots governance and other results. The author does not devalue the value of these research results, but only believes that without basic theoretical research, it is impossible to form high-quality applied research. We often see tens of thousands of words sprinkled, a bunch of data, tables, and finally a very simple conclusion, proving a problem that does not need to be proved. It can be asserted that if basic theoretical research is not strengthened, the technicalist line will be a road of no return.
Finally, in order to transcend Western centrism and build a disciplinary system, academic system and discourse system with Chinese characteristics, we should further strengthen the study of Western thought, culture, philosophy and social science. The localization of philosophy and social sciences is a living old topic that has been discussed for more than three decades. However, there is a phenomenon worth noting, that is, the people who say the most in this regard are those who do not study Western intellectual culture much, but scholars engaged in the study of the history of Western philosophy, Western modern philosophy, the history of Western political thought, and the history of Western legal thought are less likely to participate in the discussion of this issue. The author believes that these scholars must be in favor of transcending Western-centrism and achieving the localization of philosophy and social science, and they are also trying to construct a Chinese discourse of social science, and the reason why they are less involved in the discussion of this issue is because they clearly know that transcendence is not easy.
There is a common sense, if we want to overtake on the road, we must first know where the car we want to overtake is, the driving habits of the car in front of us, and what the speed is. The same is true of transcendent Western-centrism. If we want to transcend Western-centrism in the field of philosophy and social sciences, we should know what Western thinkers have said in modern times, what the values they advocate are in their original sense, and in what sense their ideological doctrines are reasonable. We should also know how influential scholars in the contemporary West in the field of philosophy and social sciences have their academic opinions, through what logic they have argued, in what sense their analytical framework is reasonable, what values their research results embody, what kind of answers they have given to those questions of universal significance in the political life of human society, and how we should respond if the answers they give are not in line with our values.
In short, it is precisely because we want to go beyond Western-centrism and build a philosophical and social science discourse system with Chinese characteristics that we need to have a more accurate understanding of Western thought and culture and contemporary Western philosophy and social science.
Article source: Academic Frontiers Magazine January 2022 (WeChat has abridged)
Author: Sun Xiaochun, Professor of Zhou Enlai School of Government, Nankai University
Editor-in-charge of the original text: Chen Luying
Editor-in-Charge of New Media: Tannins
Vision: Liu Jie
(Image from the Internet)